al Qaeda has taken heavy casualties in the western town of Ubaydi. Since the assault force of Operation Steel Curtain moved from Husaybah and Karabilah to Ubaydi early Monday, eighty insurgents and terrorists have been killed in the town, with thirty killed since just last evening. Over 150 insurgents are believed to have been captured […]
The assault on al Qaeda’s network and leaders along the western Euphrates River Valley proceeds apace. Five regional leaders of al Qaeda in Iraq have been confirmed killed in an airstrike in Husaybah. Multinational Forces – West gives a breakdown on the leaders killed in the October 29th raids. Among those killed are: • Abu […]
Coalition forces continue to press operations in the heart of the Sunni Triangle. The towns of Haditha and Karabilah are the latest targets. Haditha, which has been inaccurately referred to the Zarqawi’s “Islamic Republic of Haditha” , was the focus of a raid by ground forces, followed by airstrikes. A terrorist complex was uncovered, and […]
After Tal Afar, al Qaeda strikes in its predictable and brutal fashion: suicide bombs and terror. In Baghdad, a suicide bomber lures in Shiite day-laborers, blows up his truck. Reports indicate 114 killled and 156 wounded in this single incident. Mohammed at Iraq the Model states eleven separate explosions in Baghdad ocurred in today. According […]
U.S. and Iraqi forces have launched the largest operation since Fallujah last November. Over 5,000 U.S. and Iraq troops strike at the town of Tal Afar, which is located west of Mosul, along the northern ratline from Syria. The insurgents have taken heavy casualties, and U.S. Army helicopter pilots are learning to spot IED deployments […]
Exactly two weeks after the terrorist attacks on the London tubes which killed 54 and wounded over 700, London has been subjected to another round of bombings on its transit system. Reports are sketchy and still being sorted out. The Counterterrorism Blog is the best place to receive up-to-date links to news reports and expert […]
The following visual presentation is a compilation of the major al Qaeda attacks since the creation of the International Islamic Front and their subsequent declaration of war in February of 1998. Click this link to view the presentation. You will need to install Macromedia Flash Player, which can be downloaded here. The purpose of the […]
The insurgency tries its hand once more at a massed assault, this time on an Iraqi police station in Baghdad. Omar from Iraq The Model directs us to an article in the Guardian on the assault, and rightly points out the negative slant in the article (hat tip to Soldier’s Dad). The Guardian titles this […]
The brutal acts of violence directed at civilians and Iraqi police is losing favor among some of the members of the Iraqi insurgency. During Operation Matador, we saw examples of the local tribes, some of whom are sympathetic or even participating in the insurgency, rise up to fight the foreign jihadis after their attempts to […]
In an article titled “Insurgents Flourish in Iraq’s Wild West” , the Los Angeles Times offers a bleak assessment of the availability of Coalition and Iraqi forces in the Anbar province. While the Marines involved in Operation Matador were able to easily sweep through Western Iraq and kill and capture al Qaeda members, they have […]
Two new accounts of the al Qaeda assault on Camp Gannon in Husaybah appear in USA Today and the Washington Post. By both accounts, Marine Lance Corporal Joshua Butler is due to receive some medals for his heroism in the fight. He repeatedly exposing himself to fire, and destroyed two of the suicide vehicles – […]
Al Qaeda has followed through on its plan to attack US bases on a larger scale. The Washington Post reports that Camp Gannon, a US post on the Syrian border, was attacked by a formation of al Qaeda fighters. As stated in last week in A Change in Tactics, direct assaults on American and Iraqi […]
In a recent interview, CENTCOM Commanding General John Abizaid calls for action against the dangerous Wahhabi and Salafi ideologies espoused by Osama bin Laden and other Islamist terrorists. General John Abizaid notes that al Qaeda has suffered a string of military failures on the battlefield against American forces but still remains a threat as a […]
Hit and run tactics continue throughout the Sunni Triangle. Baghdad, Mosul, Ramadi and other cities and towns continue to encounter attacks on police stations, coalition forces, and civilians in the form of ambushes and suicide bombings. The removal of Fallujah as a base of operations to the insurgents and terrorists is a blow to the […]
Information on the Iraqi forces fighting in Fallujah is difficult to come by as the media is focusing on the front line battles, which are mainly conducted by American soldiers and Marines. The Iraqi Army and National Guard have been widely criticized by the American media for problems with training and morale. Most recently, before […]
The Second Battle of Fallujah has begun. After weeks of failed attempts to negotiate with the various indigenous local factions, Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi has declared a state of emergency and has given the vast forces arrayed against Fallujah the permission to attack. The Adventures of Chester provides the order of battle, which is […]
“First we’re going to cut it off, and then we’re going to kill it.” General Colin Powell, Gulf War I The battle to retake the untamed region of Iraq commonly known as the Sunni Triangle has been underway for several months. While there has been reporting of the discrete assaults on individual cities and towns, […]